Heinrich Diem---seeking information

[Steve Whitley]

I have been able to find very little information on Diem outside of a few brief mentions of collaboration with Ziegenhan and one or two small advertisements from period media. Does anyone have further information or a recommended source of information for filling in some blanks on the history of Heinrich Diem? Practically anything would be helpful, and greatly appreciated.

Steve Whitley

[algmule]

Hello

Steve,
you have a pm.

Kind regards
Peter

[mike ford]

Steve,
It won't be helpful for your purposes but, Diem seems like a Vietnamese name- maybe a French connection?
Mike

[Axel E]

Mike, our friends Bernd Kellner and "Flintenkalle" Pape list 16 Diems active at one time or another in the German guntradebefore 1945:
Heinrich and Hermann in Suhl.
August, Karl, Hans,Franz, Gustav, 2Heinrich, Norbert in Suhl – Benshausen.
2 August, 2 Veit, Gustav in Zella – Mehlis
Sebastian in Mannheim
So Diem is not an exactly rare name of German gunsmithes and dates far before the times when the GDR imported Vietnamese workers. BTW many Germans fought in Vietnam before most Americans had ever heard about that country: The French had pressed many German POWs into their Foreign Legion after WW2.

[mike ford]

Axel,
Yes, the SS could join the Foreign Legion and if they lived through it would come away with a clean record. The French were there (not just Nam, the whole French Indo China) a hundred years before. A lot of Germans were killed at Dien Binh Phu(?) in 1954, in a major tactical mistake by misestimating the Communist's ability to move artillery to the mountain tops without machinery. BTW the FRG also had refugees ( "Boat People")from Viet Nam. I saw them in Muennerstadt in 1980. I was thankful the FRG agreed to help them, our Democrats stabbed them in the back.
Mike

[algmule]

Hello

As for Karl Diem (a Karl Diem senior), Benshausen, there is a DRGM for a “Bolzenverschluss für Kipplaufgewehre” in his name from 1914. As there was a senior Karl Diem there must have been a junior Karl Diem and IF junior was involved in gun manufacturing/the gun trade we have two Karl Diems from Benshausen.

Kind regards
Peter